Daimler Launches Private Car Sharing App, All Makes May Apply

Global carmakers are shoving back mightily against their perceived digital disruption by Silicon Valley newcomers. The world’s oldest automaker for instance, Germany’s Daimler, puts its future strategy under the CASE moniker, which stands for “Connectivity, Autonomous, Sharing, and Electric,” as Daimler’s Japan resident Albert X. Kirchmann explained to me today in Tokyo, resolutely adding that the time-frame for CASE is “from now through 2025, and not 2075.”

As part of that CASE strategy, the Stuttgart company today launched a car sharing app called CROOVE. “The crucial difference compared with car-sharing models like car2go is that Croove now lets private vehicle owners share their car too,” the company said today. Unlike similar sharing entries announced but often not yet implemented by companies such as Toyota, Nissan, or China’s new LYNK&CO, Daimler’s CROOVE app allows you to share any car, not just one of the respective maker. Daimler basically sponsors a future "AirBnB on wheels," as Daimler CEO Dieter Zetsche characterized the service at the Paris auto show.

What at first glance looks as a charitable enterprise strictly for the public good, actually is a shrewd move by Daimler. The app is connected to a payment platform, and Daimler likely will retain a small fee for their trouble. Also, and probably more importantly, CROOVE gives Daimler data that can be a goldmine for any auto marketer.

Croove is a smartphone-based platform. The app will be available from December in the Apple iTunes store, and a little later in Google Play for all the Android users. Hirers must be 21, and have a drivers license. The car can’t be older than 15 years. That’s it. CROOVE will be test-marketed in Munich, Germany, first, and rolled out to other markets when successful.

With the private carsharing app CROOVE, Daimler tries to build on its rich experience with commercial taxis. In Europe, Daimler is a major supplier of cars for taxi operators. Much to the surprise of visitors, the bulk of taxis in Germany are made by Mercedes. Daimler also is a major force in the field of taxi-booking apps. Daimler bought ride-hail app MyTaxi in 2014, and just merged it with UK’s Hailo, creating Europe's largest app-based taxi booking service with a total of 100,000 drivers. “MyTaxi,” says Financial Times, “believes it has an advantage over Uber and Lyft as European regulators are overwhelmingly hostile towards the ride-hailing apps offered by the US groups.”

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I have been communicating in, for, and about the auto industry since age 23. I have done so in Europe, the U.S., China, and Japan. I have settled down in Tokyo, the only place in the world where you can cover nearly half of the global auto industry by using the train. Cars a...